


her name is

by orphan_account



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Drabble, Gen, Names, mild touching upon weight gain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-11-15 11:14:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20865281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Her name is Veth, meaning ‘our god who is bountiful’.





	her name is

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [this tumblr post](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/524267) by disasterhumans. 

Her name is Veth, meaning ‘our god who is bountiful’.  
  
She hates farming: and her family looks upon her with disdain as she avoids the farm, opting to read or stay outside, collecting buttons. She is loud and brash, like one of the boys: but the boys don’t like her, and she gets chased, while shrieking with hysterical laughter.  
  
Felderwin points out all of her insecurities: for appearance, the fat on her thighs, arms and stomach, the bushy brows she never grooms, the always frowning face – for personality, it’s the fact that she’s not smart, not brave, not fast, not pretty, not talented, not strong, not dexterous, not resilient.  
  
She continues on, but her heart is battered.

  
Her name is Not when she sees herself in a puddle: dark green skin and hair, all skin and bone and edges all over, eerie yellow sclera and slit pupils.  
  
She sees herself in a puddle and her insecurities come to life: not pretty, not pretty, not pretty. She gets taken in by the clan that had drowned her, and she is like herself again – but in all the wrong, despairing ways, and she sees herself as everything she thought she was: not talented, not strong, not resilient, not smart – and more: not mean, not tough, not scary, not cruel, not brave – they coin that her epithet, a cruel irony: Not the Brave, they jeer her name when she walks.  
  
She’s shunted off to the side as a servant, cleaning plates and tables from the goblins meals, and she observes, and she waits.  
  
She gets out, half a year later.

  
Her name is Nott when she gets thrown into the jail cell after months of surviving.  
  
She learns how to operate a crossbow – how to maintain it, and she is faster and sneakier and less noticeable – but not sneaky enough to avoid detection.  
  
There is a man in a jail cell, reddish-orange all over, and she ignores him until he sends his cat over. She says she is Not; like ‘not’ something, but the man ( who is Caleb ) calls her ‘Nott’, enunciating the ‘t’.  
  
She has no heart to correct him.  
  
She runs the name under her tongue when he sleeps, and she reads in a book one day that the name is to mean ‘dweller of rocky hills’.  
  
She doesn’t mind the name sticking – she’s dwelled in rocky hills for months, now.  
  
The name sticks, when she’s with him. It sticks for a very long time.

  
  
Her name is Knot when she reads the letter by Calianna, the half-draconic girl that was genuinely kind – and she didn’t trust her at all, but that doesn’t mean anything now she’s on her own adventures – and Nott has no idea that Calianna didn’t know how her name was spelt until now.  
  
She reads it, and she laughs at the irony of it. A name, once indicative of her uselessness, of her sheer mediocrity – and Calianna assumes it’s after a sailing knot ( fitting theme with Fjord, the actual sailor ), something that fastens; ties things together.  
  
Knot is a binding force – and she smiles at the irony, and at the same time, how true it is: Caleb wanted to run, but they had stuck for long enough that the two of them considered them family. She follows Fjord in his quest to collect the Cloven Stones – supports him when his powers go awry, when Uk’otoa tests him. She jokes with Jester and blossoms a tight-knit friendship with her. She bonds with Yasha over flowers and rats and jokes about her past. She competes with Beau on trees and supports her in battle. She does her best to connect with Caduceus – first on the ship, and when she continues her journey.  
  
She needles the Nein into bonding, into trusting each other with their feelings and their insecurities. A smile pries at her lips.  
  
It’s nice, she thinks – to think of her name as a reminder of her contributions.

  
Her name is Nott the Brave when she introduces herself. She says it with confidence, that she is Nott the Brave, a little goblin girl who was once a young halfling woman named Veth Brenatto.  
  
When she says it, it means everything she isn’t: not pretty, not good, not strong, not powerful, not mean, not cruel, not tough.  
  
When she says it, it also means everything she is: a protector, a lover, a mood maker, a mother, a friend, a confidant, a collector.  
  
When she says it – it’s a mix of everything she is and everything she isn’t. It’s not derogatory on her tongue, and it’s not unintentional praise.  
  
It’s who she is.

**Author's Note:**

> i love nott the brave sm and i was spurred to write one dreary midnight day


End file.
